How Microsoft hedged its 64-bit Alpha NT bets

Posted two statements on the same day

We've now received copies of two postings Microsoft did on the same day about the future of 64-bit Alpha NT. Both appeared on August 24. In the first posting, Microsoft said: "This announcement does not currently affect our plans to develop and support 64-bit versions of our products on the Alpha platform. Compaq, as well as our other OEM partners, will continue to work with us to deliver a 64-bit version of Windows for our enterprise customers." In the second posting, Microsoft said: "There will be no future releases of Microsoft products for the 32-bit or 64-bit Alpha platform. This means there will not be 32-bit Alpha versions of Windows 2000, beginning with Release Candidate 2, nor will there be new 32-bit Alpha releases of SQL Server, Exchange, or other 32-bit Alpha BackOffice products. There will also be no 64-bit version of Windows or BackOffice developed for the Alpha platform. " And the current version of this release can be found here. It sort of combines the two, but misses out some bits about NT on Intel working faster than Unix systems on RISC platforms. One of the interesting facets to this is that Intel and its IA-64 Merced architecture now wins, if you want to use Win64 NT, that is... ® See alsoHow a leaked Pesatori Alpha NT customer letter looksLeaked Compaq Q&A shows level of 64-bit NT Alpha chaos